Interesting People mailing list archives
Shorrock: Hubris Unbound -- The Bush / Carlyle connection
From: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 14:40:08 -0400
------ Forwarded Message From: "John F. McMullen" <observer () westnet com> Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 14:29:07 -0400 (EDT) To: "johnmac's living room" <johnmacsgroup () yahoogroups com> Cc: Dave Farber <farber () cis upenn edu> Subject: Shorrock: Hubris Unbound -- The Bush / Carlyle connection
From the Nation --
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20030526&s=shorrock Hubris Unbound by Tim Shorrock On May 2 President George W. Bush zoomed off the deck of the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln, where he had declared victory in Iraq following a televised landing in a US Navy S-3B Viking jet. A few hours later, Bush landed in California's Silicon Valley, where he abruptly changed the topic of the day from triumphant war to sputtering economy. Mindful of the slowdown in what was once a high-tech symbol of US economic might, Bush's handlers carefully chose his stop in Santa Clara. The President avoided the traditional walk-through at Intel, Cisco Systems or Apple. Instead, as reported by David Sanger of the New York Times, Bush "pulled into the well-protected grounds of United Defense Industries, which produces the Bradley fighting vehicle, tanks and other equipment that became familiar to television viewers watching the 350-mile race to Baghdad last month." There, standing before an array of weapons used in Iraq, Bush made his stand for a $550 billion tax cut that Republicans pray will revive investment, cut the deficit and bring back thousands of jobs lost over the past eighteen months. He thanked the assembled United Defense workers for their products, especially the Bradleys, which he boasted "were responsible for a lot of tank kills" in Iraq. But Sanger, along with every other reporter covering the speech, neglected to mention a crucial fact about United Defense. It is majority-owned and controlled by the Carlyle Group, the Washington, DC, merchant bank in which Bush's father, George H.W. Bush, has a direct financial interest and serves as a trusted adviser. Yet the American public was kept in the dark about this relationship by the newspaper of record, along with the Washington Post, CNN and every other major media outlet. To people who follow these things, the silence was deafening. "It's not irony anymore; its just shameless and brazen," said Dan Briody, a New York journalist who broke one of the first stories about Bush's connection to Carlyle. His new book, The Iron Triangle: Inside the Secret World of the Carlyle Group, tells the story of Carlyle's rise from a lowly buyout firm to the nation's tenth largest--and arguably most politically connected--military contractor. "I've been amazed at some of these arrangements that have taken place, like the Halliburton situation," Briody said, referring to the oil services company formerly headed by Vice President Dick Cheney that won a government contract to stamp out oil fires in Iraq. "This Administration keeps making decisions that benefit themselves and their friends, and I don't see an end to it." The day we spoke, Representative Henry Waxman released a US Army document disclosing that Halliburton's no-bid contract was much broader than initially described, and included oil operations and distribution that could increase the cost of the contract to $7 billion. Briody's book on Carlyle, published by John Wiley & Sons, is an excellent place to begin understanding the intertwining of business, lobbying and foreign policy that define the twenty-first-century version of the military industrial complex. A key chapter recounts Carlyle's 1997 acquisition of United Defense for the "fire-sale price" of $850 million and documents how Carlyle spent more than $1.2 million on lobbyists, who roamed Capitol Hill on behalf of United Defense and its weapons systems. Among Carlyle's current holdings that Briody lists in an appendix are Composite Structures, which makes metal parts for the AH-64 Apache Helicopter; Lier Siegler Services, which provides logistics support and maintenance for Army vehicles and Air Force jets; and USIS, which performs background checks on millions of government and corporate employees and stands to make a killing in the booming homeland security business. With Bush preparing the American people for more battles ahead, "it's more crucial than ever that the press pick up the scent of this story until we make some change," Briody said. First and foremost, he argued, Bush Sr. should resign from the Carlyle Group "because of the obvious conflict of interest of working for a company that has such huge defense interests while his son is waging these wars." Chris Ullman, Carlyle's vice president for corporate communications, rejected that idea. "Former President Bush's relationship with his son has nothing to do with Carlyle or our investments," he said in an e-mail. "The former president does not discuss Carlyle matters with his son; the success of our firm rests on the hard work of our investment professionals." As for Briody's book, Ullman said: "Peel away the layers of factual errors and the self-righteousness and all you're left with is baseless innuendo. This book should be exposed for what it is, a compilation of recycled conspiracy theories masquerading as investigative journalism." That's something readers can judge for themselves. But does the mainstream press really think the Bush-Carlyle connection is irrelevant? And in the stories about Bush's speech at United Defense, did it simply fail to note the company's connection with Carlyle, which can easily be made with a quick search on Google? I put those questions to Sanger on his message machine at the Times's Washington bureau, but he never returned my call. Maybe next time he'll get it right. Tim Shorrock is a Maryland freelance journalist who who grew up in Seoul and Tokyo and has been reporting about Asia, globalization and finance for more than twenty years, for many publications at home and abroad. He can be reached at tshorrock51 () hotmail com Copyright 2003 The Nation *** FAIR USE NOTICE. This message contains copyrighted material whose use has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. The 'johnmacsgroup' Internet discussion group is making it available without profit to group members who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information in their efforts to advance the understanding of literary, educational, political, and economic issues, for non-profit research and educational purposes only. I believe that this constitutes a 'fair use' of the copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use,' you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml "When you come to the fork in the road, take it" - L.P. Berra "Always make new mistakes" -- Esther Dyson "Be precise in the use of words and expect precision from others" - Pierre Abelard "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" -- Arthur C. Clarke John F. McMullen johnmac () acm org johnmac () cyberspace org ICQ: 4368412 AIM & Yahoo Messenger: johnmac13 http://www.westnet.com/~observer ------ End of Forwarded Message ------------------------------------- You are subscribed as interesting-people () lists elistx com To manage your subscription, go to http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/
Current thread:
- Shorrock: Hubris Unbound -- The Bush / Carlyle connection Dave Farber (May 12)